Village Centenary (24 page)

She touched on the clothes worn, the lunches brought, the great distances trudged in all weathers, and the universal poverty which dogged almost all. She also dwelt on the happiness found in simple things: the occasional treat, the annual outing, harvest home, a visit from the bishop, as well as the ineffable joy of country things such as the first primroses, the cuckoo's call and the return of the swallows.

There was no doubt about it. As I had suspected, Miss Clare's contribution, made incidentally without any recourse to her notes, was the highlight of the afternoon, although the following scene, showing the school's part in the war of George the Fifth's reign, obviously moved many of those who could remember those sad times.

Mr Lamb's recollections of the trip to Wembley from the school gave us all a chance to laugh. Some of his contemporaries interrupted his narrative with downright contradictions, but it was all done with such enthusiasm and merriment that his contribution was a resounding success.

Mrs Austen's vivid account of an evacuee's view of Fairacre was warmly received, and probably because she

was a woman, she was not open to the same outspoken comments which had punctuated Mr Lamb's account.

Then it was my turn to give an idea of the school in the reign of our present Queen Elizabeth the Second. I had tried to make it a brief survey and as interesting as possible, but feared it might be something of a comedown after the earlier contributions.

It was a kind audience, however, and genuinely interested, I felt, in the changes which had taken place since the Act of 1944 when the children over eleven went off to Beech Green or Caxley Grammar School, and Fairacre was left as a junior school. The repercussions of the ancient grammar school being obliged to become a comprehensive school were also mentioned, for this fact touched many of the families present.

The children's work was on display round the walls and at one end of the room, and I invited the audience to inspect everything and to see how methods of work had altered over the hundred years. The whole school then clustered on to our temporary stage and sang two songs very sweetly.

Finally, the vicar rose and made a fine speech about the great part this old school had played in village life, and complimented everyone on the work done, not only on the stage this afternoon, but behind the scenes for many, many years. He then asked us all to join in a prayer of thanksgiving for mercies received in the past, and to call a blessing on Fairacre School's future.

While this was being done and heads were bent, I could hear the welcome sound of Mrs Pringle and her band of helpers, dealing with the tea things in the other lobby. Festivity was about to follow reverence.

It was astonishing to see how quickly the mounds of provender vanished. Appetites are keen in our sharp downland air, and I was kept busy filling cups from the tea urn borrowed from the Woman's Institute for the two occasions.

But at last the great moment came when the vicar called for silence, the door opened and Mrs Willet came staggering in, bearing the magnificent cake ablaze with one hundred candles. A great cheer went up and the ancient floorboards quaked under the stamping of stout country boots.

We had asked Miss Clare, as the oldest pupil present, and the youngest child from the infants' room to cut the cake together. My bread knife only just proved equal to severing the beautifully dark, rich mixture, but the two won through eventually and a slice was delivered to everyone present.

It was dark by the time the last of our visitors had gone. The fragrance of the fruit cake still lingered about the empty schoolroom, and far too many crumbs lay upon the floor.

'It all went beautifully,' I said to Miss Clare before we walked across the playground to my home. 'But I don't know what Mrs Pringle will say when she sees the mess.'

'What Mrs Pringle says,' Miss Clare told me, 'can have very little meaning in face of a hundred years of our school's history.'

And with this comforting thought we strolled home to take our ease. There was a sharp nip in the air, and our breath was visible in the dusk.

'A frost tonight,' said Miss Clare. 'The first real one of the winter.'

Sure enough, when I took her breakfast tray into my spare room the next morning, the trees and grass were white with
hoar frost. It was a lovely sight, but a pointer to things to come.

Miss Clare protested about being waited on, but I was adamant that she stayed in bed for an hour or two longer. We had a repeat performance to go through in the afternoon, and I knew that there would be a great many friends who would want to talk to her.

As it was the last day of term, too, I should be busy clearing up and trying to remind the children of the date of our return in January, as well as keeping them relatively calm and prepared for their final performance. I found that it was no easy task. Success had quite gone to their heads, and I had never known them quite so excited and noisy. I pushed them out early to play in the frosty playground and to run off some of their excess energy.

Miss Briggs, whose class was suffering from the same
joie de vivre,
joined me in the playground, and we gave them all a further ten minutes of strenuous exercise. If anything, these tactics seemed to rouse them even more, but we ushered the breathless mob indoors, and I suggested that a story might calm them down.

'We have to expect this sort of thing on the last day of term,' I said indulgently. 'And then, of course, there's Christmas looming ahead. Are you going home?'

'Yes,' said my assistant.

'Tonight? Will you want to get off early?'

I wished I could remember if it were Droitwich or Harrogate. Somewhere a good distance away, I knew.

'No. It seemed better to go tomorrow in the light, and anyway Wayne doesn't finish until tomorrow morning.'

I must have looked blank.

'I'm driving home to Leamington and taking him with me.'

Leamington.
I must remember
Leamington.

'That will be nice for you both,' I said, anxious not to appear too pressing, but Miss Briggs was well launched.

'My parents know about him, of course, but haven't met him yet. I expect we'll announce our engagement at Christmas.'

I said, quite truthfully, that I was delighted to hear the news, and that Wayne was a fine young man.

Miss Briggs gave me the biggest smile I had yet seen upon her countenance, and we returned to the noisy rabble within.

Our second afternoon was even more successful than the first. For one thing, all those taking part were more relaxed, and the audience was even larger than the day before. How they all managed to squeeze in I shall never fathom.

Mrs Willet's second cake was as rapturously received as the first, and almost all the school's offerings went too. The few cakes that remained, I put into a paper bag to give surreptitiously to the Coggs family later.

Miss Clare was surrounded by friends, among them Elizabeth Mawne who had not met her before. Their conversation was animated, and I was glad to see my old friend Dolly so lively. I began to realise, more sharply than ever before, that she normally lacked company, and I was glad that I was about to invite her to spend Christmas with me.

Even Mrs Pringle seemed to have mellowed with our festivities, and said nothing about the floor strewn with crumbs.

'I'll see to that tea urn,' she said. 'The W.I. can turn a bit funny if it's not returned pronto, and
clean.
'

At last we said goodbye to our guests, reiterated the phrase: 'Term begins on January the sixth' to those willing to listen, who were few among the general pandemonium, and left the schoolroom to the ministrations of Mrs Pringle and Mr and Mrs Willet, who insisted on putting all to rights.

'Well,' I said to Miss Clare, when we sank exhausted one each side of my sitting-room fire. 'I'm whacked! Someone else will have to cope with the next centenary.'

'But it's really been
memorable
!' replied Dolly. 'How glad I am to have seen it - and to have taken part!'

'Have a glass of sherry,' I said, struggling to my feet. 'We need a pick-me-up after all that.'

'Here's to Fairacre School,' said Dolly, raising her glass, and we drank thankfully.

'Have you any plans for Christmas?' I asked, after the first rejuvenating mouthful.

'None. Except that I expect the kind Annetts will invite me there for Christmas Day.'

I said how much I should like her to come to Fairacre for the two days, or longer if she could manage it.

'There's nothing I should enjoy more,' she told me. And so it was happily settled.

'I can honestly say I never feel truly lonely,' she went on, 'but now that I'm such "a great age I've no one of my own left. Ada's children lost touch years ago, even before my sister died. Of course, dear Emily meant more to me than anyone in the world, but when she went there was really no one left, except good friends like you. I believe you are in the same boat?'

'I suppose so. No really close relations, though I have a dear aunt, and some jolly cousins, but they are all as busy as I am, and we don't keep in touch as we should. No, I'm like you, very glad of good friends who live near enough to see frequently, like you and the Annetts and dear old Amy at Bent, who wants to meet you incidentally.'

'That will be nice,' said Dolly. She sounded a trifle abstracted, and I wondered if she were over-tired, which would not be surprising. She took another sip from her glass, and then put it carefully on the side table.

'I think I ought to tell you something which perhaps I should have told you before. When I was talking to that nice Mrs Mawne this afternoon, I realised for the first time that you might be worrying about what might happen to you if this school ever had to close.'

'Well, that's been a possibility for years, of course,' I said, puzzled.

'You see, my dear, having no relatives to speak of, I left everything to dear Emily as she had nowhere of her own to live, and only a tiny pension. Not that I had much more, of course, but I did have the cottage to shelter us. When she had gone, I went one day to Caxley to see young Mr Lovejoy and to alter my will.'

Young Mr Lovejoy, I knew, was about to retire as he was now in his sixties. But to Miss Clare, whose family had dealt with the old-established solicitors for two or three generations, young Mr Lovejoy must seem a mere boy.

'He was as charming as ever,' said Dolly, 'and we made out a nice simple little will, leaving some money to the church at Beech Green and the same to Fairacre. My few trinkets I've left to Isobel Annett. Nothing much of value there, I'm afraid, but some are quite pretty.'

'She'll treasure them, I'm sure,' I said.

Miss Clare picked up her glass again. 'And the house I've left to you.'

I felt my jaw drop. I gazed at her, speechless with shock.

'Do you mind?' asked Dolly very gently.

'Mind?' I croaked. 'I don't know what to say!'

'I wanted it to be a surprise for you when I'd gone. I knew you hadn't made any arrangements to buy a place, and I thought you could find a home there while you looked round, if you wanted something better.'

'There is nothing better!' I whispered. My voice seemed to have collapsed completely, and my heart was jumping about like a frog.

'Well, of course, I'd always hoped that you would want to live in it, and be as happy as I have there. I ought to have realised though that you might be worrying about the future. It wasn't until this afternoon, when Mrs Mawne mentioned it, that I saw that I had really been rather self-indulgent in trying to keep my plans secret.'

'Dolly,' 1 began, trying to control my wavering voice, 'I don't know how to thank you. I'm absolutely overwhelmed, and don't deserve such generosity. I'll try to tell you soon how I feel - but I'm too overjoyed for words just now.'

'Good!' said Dolly comfortably. 'Well, that's settled. Now to more practical matters. What would you like for a Christmas present?'

I went over to kiss her.

'You've just given me one,' I told her.

Later that evening, 1 took Dolly home, and saw her safely into bed with her hot water bottle and a warm drink. By that time, I had recovered enough to tell her how I felt about her wonderful gesture. It made the future quite different for me, and I was still too dazed to comprehend fully just what it would mean.

I locked the cottage door as directed, and put the key back through the letter box. I still could not believe that one day - long distant, 1 sincerely prayed - this lovely house might be mine.

'I shall never sleep a wink,' I said to myself, as I drove back through the frosty night.

But I fell into bed within ten minutes of reaching home, and slept like a log until seven.

I resolved to say nothing about my proposed legacy to any one. Dolly wanted to keep it a secret, and I should respect that wish.

But buoyed up with my wonderful news, I set about all the Christmas tasks I had neglected during our celebrations.

Christmas cards were arriving thick and fast. Trees, flowers, robins, skating parties, and every imaginable winter activity glowed from the tributes on my mantelpiece, and I must get down to sending off some of my own.